


Shadows Are Calling

by ThreeWhiskeyLunch



Category: Mass Effect - All Media Types, Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Destroy Ending, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Post-War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-08
Updated: 2018-03-08
Packaged: 2019-03-28 20:53:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,791
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13912011
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThreeWhiskeyLunch/pseuds/ThreeWhiskeyLunch
Summary: “Don’t give in, Shepard. Don’t you fucking give in.”He hears the words, echoing in the dark, thick blackness. A voice he knows, deep within his core, a part of him every much as his own, but which he has no memory of the face that matches it. He has no memory of anything. Only nothing. And then the voice, swimming through space to seek him out, to wake him.





	Shadows Are Calling

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Junker](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Junker/gifts).



> Oh hey! I spent way too much time making a [ playlist!](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLvRr4ELzSIfgNsUt_JG8qW7i1SnV2Kjcj)

“Don’t give in, Shepard. Don’t you fucking give in.”

He hears the words, echoing in the dark, thick blackness. A voice he knows, deep within his core, a part of him every much as his own, but which he has no memory of the face that matches it. He has no memory of anything. Only nothing. And then the voice, swimming through space to seek him out, to wake him.

_A scar._

_A gun._

He tries to turn in the inky, viscous pool that holds him to find the face of the voice, but there’s no bottom for purchase, nothing to grab hold of, no way to know up from down. No light. No dim. Just the murky morass of ooze that suspends him, moves around him and through him, _is_ him. He tries to rub his thumb and forefinger together, just to feel himself, but even to move his fingers is impossible, frozen in place by the force of inertia. And yet, a touch is there, as if felt through thick layers of fabric upon fabric a thousand thousand layers thick and so very far away.

_A rough hand._

_A tender hand._

He drifts. There is nothing beyond the dark. No wonderment. No fear. No anger. It’s a familiar feeling - _he’s been here before_ \- somewhere between. Between what and where he doesn’t know and it doesn’t matter. Only that he’s in this nowhere and has no care. He _should_ have a care, but there’s only the recollection of obsession and not the obsession itself, something that drove him, kept him moving, something for which he couldn’t stop. There’s only an empty space left where the obsession once lived.

“Fight, goddamn you.”

The voice is closer and farther, right next to him, somewhere on the other side of the world, breathing in his ear and shouted through a tunnel. He tries to speak - _Who are you?_ \- tries to open his frozen mouth, but there’s nothing. No sound from his throat. No air from his lungs. His tongue rigid.

He panics. Is he breathing? He can’t feel the rise and fall of his chest, the rush of air through his nostrils. He tries to calm himself, to listen to and slow his heartbeat, but even that fails him, though he knows, he doesn’t know how he knows, but he knows this is something learned, something he’s relied on time and time again.

“Open your fucking eyes, Shepard.”

_My eyes are open._

“Doctors say there’s no hope, but that’s fucking bullshit. I know you’re in there. I know you can hear me.”

_I hear you._

The feeling of pressure on his hand increases, through the thick layers between himself and whatever warmth it is that holds him, the only thing that’s not him or the black - he is the black - and anchors him in the darkness. The only thing that’s real.

“Open your goddamn eyes.”

_Can’t you see? My eyes are open._

The voice is gruff. Sad. Determined. And somewhere a small note of hope calls out to Shepard. Desperate, persistent hope.

_Who are you to hope for me?_

“I’ve told you once, Shepard. And I’ll tell you again; a stubborn enough person can survive just about anything. Next to me, you’re about the most stubborn person I know. So wake the fuck up.” The pressure at his hand increases. If not for the layers upon layers, he’s certain it would almost hurt. And then there’s another sensation, a soft, tenderness at his temple, felt through the thick fog that sheathes him. He wants to turn to it, aches for it to return when it’s gone. “Remember back on Zorya? You told me I was a part of your team? Well, you screwed yourself then. Because I’m still fucking here. You can’t get rid of me so easily. Hell, Shepard. I’m your worst goddamn nightmare. I’ll dog your every step, worse than your own fucking shadow.” The voice draws closer, the pressure returns to his temple, and he feels the words vibrate through the thick murk, travel along every nerve in his body. “Open your goddamn eyes and tell me to get the fuck out if you have to. Send me away. I fucking _dare_ you, you bastard. Put a gun to my head—”

_A gun to his head._

“--and tell me you don’t want me here, you goddamn bastard.”

_You’re part of a team now, Zaeed._

_There’s no way we can do this unless we’re all working together._

“You want me to tell you I love you?” The voice lowers, whispers, cracking and echoing off and through everything that surrounds him. It fills him, enfolds him in a blanket of sounds, words, feelings. Makes him feel safe. “Fine. I love you. Now open those baby blues and look at me. Tell me you don’t love me. Tell me you do. I don’t give a shit. Just fight, goddamnit. Don’t leave me behind in this fucking shitty galaxy.”

_Zaeed._

_One eye vibrant green._

_One eye milky and blind._

The pain starts in his fingertips, tingling pinpricks that morph slowly, work their way up through his hands, his arms, jump to his toes, his feet, his legs. Up his buttocks and back, travel along his shoulders to converge in his spine, piercing, nails that bite and claw, twist his thoughts around and around until all he knows is awful, racking pain.

_Kill me now._

“Not bloody likely.” The voice softens, tender, tinged with humor. The pressure on his hand changes, fingers threading through his own, warm and real and rough. “Open your eyes.” The voice cajoles and chides and for all it’s gruffness, is so achingly tender and gentle Shepard turns through the grasping darkness to the sound, the familiarity of it. “C’mon now.”

“You…” He pushes the word out in a croak, his throat scratchy and dry.

“I’ll pry those eyes open if I have to, Shepard.” He feels the stroke of a thumb over an eyelid, fingers resting lightly on his temple and all his nerves fire at once, shockwave after shockwave rippling through his body. “C’mon, love.”

“ _Hurts_.”

“I know. I’ve got you. Come on back. It’s gonna be okay. You’re gonna be okay now.” Dry, chapped lips press lightly to the bridge of his nose before Zaeed moves away slightly. “Oy! You! Nurse! Shepard’s awake. Get the fucking doctor.” And then he’s back, bending close, whispering in his ear. “Alright. They’re gonna be here soon. Gonna push me away from this bed while they poke and prod and bother the fuck outta you. You gotta do me a favor before they get here. Open your eyes and look at me. Ten seconds max and then those goddamn vultures are gonna descend.”

“Tell me—”

“Tell ya what, Shepard?”

“Tell me...again.”

There’s a breathless pause, both men suspended together in time and space, and then Zaeed sighs and laughs and rubs his nose along Shepard’s jaw. “Heard that, did ya?”

“Tell me,” Shepard whispers.

The murk tries to hold him, tendrils snaking out, pulling him down. His bones are weary, muscles weak from fighting to surface. The pain takes what strength is left and devours it whole.

Then Zaeed tells him again, softly, in his ear.

He swims up and up and up through the darkness and opens his eyes.

~~~~~

**Epilogue: Somewhere warm, on a beach**

“It’s not a goddamn race,” Zaeed says, slow and steady next to him. “Take it easy.”

Shepard pauses for a moment, catching his breath, his hand resting lightly on Zaeed’s shoulder. “Alright.” He looks out over the expanse of palm trees and beach, the ocean waves washing up on shore, everything vibrant and sundrenched and so very warm and welcoming.”There some lounge chairs over there,” he leans on Zaeed’s shoulder and points with his cane at the row of chairs, dappled with sunlight through the trees.

“You sure? Sand’s gonna be weird.”

“I’m sure.”

“At least the sand’ll be soft if you fall on your ass.”

“I plan on falling on you,” Shepard says with a grin and Zaeed grins back.

“Wouldn’t be the first time.”

“Lead on then, noble stud.”

“Watch your mouth. Who you calling noble?” Zaeed takes a step, waiting for Shepard to catch up, and then another and another, always at his side, his thin-clothed side pressed to Shepard’s, warm and slightly damp from the heat.

When they reach the edge of the walk, Shepard kicks off his shoes and digs his toes into the warm, fine sand, closing his eyes with a contented hum. “Now _that’s_ what I’m talking about.”

Zaeed bends to pick up their shoes and Shepard resettles his hand on the other man’s shoulder, digging his cane into the sand. Slowly, slowly they make their way to the chairs. Shepard tires about halfway there, the sand taking more effort to walk across, but he nudges Zaeed forward when the other man senses his fatigue and wants to stop. By the time they reach their destination, and then move along a little further when Shepard spots a double lounge chair that they can both sit on, he’s struggling to not lean completely on Zaeed. Sweat breaks out on his upper lip, his heart racing and limbs trembling from the effort.

“Just for the record, I’m not carrying you back.” Zaeed takes his hand firmly in his and Shepard holds on tight as he bends his legs, sitting down on the chair with a grunt.

Shepard pushes backward with a tired sigh, closing his eyes against the midday sun, leaning his head against the headrest. “Pretty sure I could just live here for the next month or so.” He opens an eye just enough to see Zaeed smirking down at him, half in shadow as he casts his own shadow across Shepard. He pats the seat next to him in invitation with a little nod, and a hopefully suggestive quirk of his eyebrows, to which Zaeed just snorts and shakes his head.

“Can’t wait to see those headlines. The great commander Shepard, arrested for vagrancy on a public beach.” Zaeed steps around to the other side, sliding easily down onto the chair next to him. Shepard doesn’t miss how he scoots a little closer, enough that their arms brush.

Shepard tips slightly to press his shoulder to Zaeed’s. “Which would probably be one of the nicer things said about me in the press. And actually, this is a private beach—”

“Jesus, Shepard.”

“--the hotel owns it.”

Zaeed laughs and shakes his head

“So I bet if we paid them enough money, they’d probably just let us stay out here.” He turns to admire Zaeed’s profile, the sharp jut of his nose and determined chin, the angry, jagged edge of the scar that runs from eye to jaw. “Which isn’t a bad idea. Maybe they’d bring us a tent?”

“I’m not sleeping out here when there’s a perfectly good bed 20 meters away.” He lifts a finger and points at Shepard’s nose. “And I am _especially_ not having sex out here. _Sand chaffs_.”

“Who said anything about having sex?” That finger is simply too irresistible to not grab and bring to his mouth, kissing the tip before releasing it with a teasing grin.

“You did,” Zaeed growls, dropping his hand on Shepard’s thigh where it finds the edge of his shorts, fingers curling underneath the edge of fabric. “About twelve hundred fucking times since we got here. And more while we were on the way. Pestering me like a goddamn kid after rock candy—”

Shepard’s grin widens. He rests his hand on top of Zaeed’s as it lays on his thigh. “Yeah, well, I might be a bit...wound up.”

Zaeed snorts again, but his gaze is fond as he turns to look at Shepard. “That’s one word for it. You know the doctors—”

Shepard waves his hand sharply, as if the word has conjured the hated doctors out of thin air to stare down at him with disapproval. “I’m done with doctors. They can shove it. And it’s not like you haven’t been frustrated right along with me.”

The hand under his turns, palm to palm, as Zaeed twines their fingers together. “Not willing to risk your health for my goddamn sexual frustrations, Shepard.”

He considers their hands for a long time. He can feel Zaeed’s pulse, thrumming along under his fingertips, steady and strong. The heat, and his exhaustion from their short excursion from the cabin to the chair, makes him feel languid and drowsy. He closes his eyes and relaxes back into the welcome warmth of the chair, leaning more heavily on Zaeed than he’ll admit. “I never told you ‘thank you’,” he murmurs.

“What the hell for?”

“Fighting for me. Waking me up.”

Zaeed is quiet for a long time, the only sound that of the waves on the beach, the breeze rustling the palm leaves above them, the cry of seagulls circling overhead. It lures him into almost-sleep, drifting in a haze of contentment. Finally, Zaeed sighs and mutters, “You’d have done the same damned thing.”

“Yeah, but that’s me,” Shepard says, more a mumble than actual words.

“What, so I’m not allowed to care?”

Shepard shakes his head quickly. “Not at all. Just...the person I met on Omega might not have admitted to it so easily. Or at all, for that matter.”

“Lotta shit’s happened since then,” Zaeed grunts, but he doesn’t deny it and doesn’t defend it. Which says more about the man as he is now than anything else might.

“Don’t know what I’d have done without you around to keep me sane.”

“You coulda had your pick. Alenko. Cortez. Tali. Hell, I’m pretty goddamn sure Garrus has a fucking crush on you.”

Shepard stifles a choked cough, not at who Zaeed has singled out, but at the placement of his swears. He tips his head and cracks his eyes open to look over at his lover. “None of them could hold a candle to you.”

“Alright, that’s enough.” Zaeed cuts his gaze back at him, smiling and yet looking more vulnerable than he ever has since Shepard has known him. “Gonna make me blush.”

“You blush?”

“Shut up.”

“Okay.” He leans close for a kiss, soft and light, humming a sigh of contentment.

They sit in silence for a while, until a salarian waiter approaches them for their drink order, bumbling over his words when he realizes who the man is that sits on his beach. Zaeed practically has to scare him away with threats of no tip before he scampers away with the promise of fruity drinks with umbrellas that Shepard had requested of him.

“Told you I shoulda brought Jessie,” Zaeed says, once settled back at Shepard’s side, his hand dropped once again on Shepard’s thigh.

“Only you would want to bring a gun to the beach.”

Zaeed jerks his other hand out, indicating the salarian as Prime Example Number One of Why Guns Must Be Brought on Vacation. “That waiter’ll bring _friends_. Won’t get a moment’s peace.”

“Pretty sure we’re paying enough money to stay here that ‘moment’s peace’ comes included in the package.”

“You put too much faith—”

“Hush.”

“Shepard.”

“Next topic.”

“But you—”

“The Valiant is a better rifle than the Black Widow.”

And that stops Zaeed in his tracks. The other man stares at him, hard and unyielding, before he says, “I don’t even know who the fuck you are anymore.”

Shepard rolls his eyes, laughing softly. “You fall for that every time.”

“I don’t.”

“You do.”

Zaeed huffs and crosses his arms, leaving Shepard’s leg feeling suddenly cooler. And very lonely. So Shepard nudges him with his elbow and smiles, fond and affectionate and probably far too dorky for anyone else in the universe to see. Zaeed purses his lips and frowns, but not an angry sort of frown, instead he looks like he’s trying not to smile back. And then he sighs and lifts up his arm to wrap around Shepard’s shoulders.

“You’re an idiot,” Zaeed says.

“I’m _your_ idiot.”

“Fuck, yeah.” He tugs Shepard closer and they sit and watch the waves, and the seagulls, and the shadows of the leaves on their legs. The waiter brings them fruity drinks with umbrellas (and no friends) and they toast to nothing but being alone on the beach together. It is, Shepard decides, absolutely perfect.

“So…” Shepard says.

“So.”

“Garrus, huh?”

“Shoulda kept my big mouth shut.”

Shepard laughs at the other man’s grumbling, snuggling closer in his embrace.

“Tell me if you’ve heard this one before,” Zaeed says, launching in to one of his stories about the time he took on thirteen krogan.

Shepard doesn’t tell him that he has.

_fin_

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!


End file.
